Here I Am, World, I'm Great

Recently God spoke to me through a show my sweet boy likes to watch, Wonder Pets. Seriously? Yes, indeed!

There is an episode where Ming Ming duck decides to try to save some animals on her own (instead of the usual teamwork) and while on her way she sings a sweet song, ending with the line, "Here I am, world, I'm great!" Well, in true fashion, at least one line from every show watched has to be stuck in mommy's head, and that's always the one from that episode. The thing is every time I sing it in my head I sing, "Here I am, Lord, I'm great!" As I stood doing the dishes singing the line to myself one day, I realized... There is a HUGE difference between those two lines! Then God asked me, "Do you know the difference? Do you live the difference?" Yikes. I thought about it for one moment before a little boy came toddling in the kitchen, yelling, "Mommy!" and asked me to pick him up to dance to Me Without You by Toby Mac on the radio. :D

Being the best.

After spending too much time on Pinterest and Facebook in an evening, I feel inadequate. I decided a few weeks ago to take that under control and give it to God. I'm not positive there are others that struggle in the same way, but I'm guessing so. Just like seeing a bunch of models makes the average American woman feel at least slightly unsightly, seeing all the amazing things that people do/ are able to do on my social media sites,  I feel like I should be able to do those things, too, and inadequate that I can't.

I've been that way for a long time. I always want to be the best at things. I want to be the best at way more things than I am able to. I want to be a super mommy, wife, Christian, money-saver, photographer, home-fixer-upper, sew-er, blogger, cleaner, teacher, nanny, graphic designer, and the list goes on (best ebay and craigslist-seller?). Can I be super at some of those things? Definitely! Do I need to be the best at all of them? Nope - and I don't think God wants me to be!

One Year Young!

It's been over a week since  Jordan's first birthday party. That's right, he's... ONE! Whoa. Yeah, we're basically in denial, still!

He has grown and changed soooo much in one year, I don't even want to think about the fact that that is going to happen over and over again. Josh and I watched a video last night "Birth to twelve years in 2 minutes and 45 seconds." Josh said, "That is what it is really going feel like isn't it?" Probably.

The fun (and scary?) thing now is that his changes are becoming so much more drastic and quick!

First {Football} Birthday Party!

Summary of the day. Joy, fun, love. Success.

[Lots of photos ahead, fyi!]

I'm so excited to finally post about Jordan's first birthday party! I had so much fun putting it all together! Everything was DIY, and I feel like I did well :-) {Kudos and thanks to my mom for helping a bunch, and for my Klein family for making pom poms & helping decorate!}

It was a whirlwind of a weekend, and we were so excited to be able to have lots of family at Jordan's party. (Even more were there for his dedication at church the day before!) Both sets of parents, Josh's grandparents on his mom's side, his sister and his cousin were all there to share with us along with some very close friends. It was a joyous time; Jordan totally had fun, that was my goal!

We made: a banner, growth "chart", pom-poms, foam fingers, a party hat and football cakes.

3 Great Blogs for Playful Mamas

Earlier this week in the morning I was [yet again] thinking about something I could post on our blog... I narrated the beginning sentences in my head, just as I always do, and "rewrote" and "edited." And then, about 10 minutes later as my son let me know I was done getting ready ;), the thoughts flew from my brain, probably never to be retrieved. This happens a lot, especially when I lay in bed at night (losing the thoughts when I drift off), or when I'm getting ready in the morning. When I do remember my thoughts at a later time I often decide, "nobody wants to read about that anyway"...

But I came across a new blog.

Word[less] Wednesday 4-4

Begging at the table! :-)

Wordless Wednesday 3-21

My sweetie (9 mo) and one of the boys I nanny (13 mo)... they love to crawl up the stairs together, giggling, screaming, and laughing the whole way (even though there's another one asleep behind the door right in front of them ;)).

Sunshine!

I am so overwhelmed by the sunshine and *perfect* weather today. We were gone over the weekend last weekend for a wedding and when we got home, I realized that spring seems to have a whole new meaning for me this year. I've never been one to really make much ado about the changing of seasons, but my son? He loves outside in this nice weather!

Wordless Wednesday 3-7

{Alright, I'm going to try to jump on the "Wordless Wednesday" train! Here's my first post :-)}

Growing so fast

I can hardly believe how fast Jordan is growing. He changes so much in such short amounts of time. It's so fun to see him grow in his independence as well as his abilities! He crawls like a pro. He can pull himself to stand so easily now, and lets himself back down with ease [almost] every time. He can chew food. He can find the toy he wants out of the toybox. He is learning to stop when we say, "no!" He even showed us some great stair-climbing skills yesterday. Such a blessing to get to be with him all day to experience so much of his growing and changing as well!

This picture from yesterday makes me smile every time I look at it... Such a big boy!

My parents got him this toy for Christmas and we got it out this weekend. He can push himself backwards on it a little, but we only put him on to push him around on it, which he loves!, otherwise he gets all giddy just sitting on the floor playing with the different do-dads or pushing it around. I just can't get over how big he looks sitting on it!

Simplify {and Circumstances}

A friend of mine from Grace has started to write more blog posts recently as well, and I'm beginning to realize why there are SO many mommas blogging out there... for so many of us it is most definitely relaxing! :-) As I got myself hyped up about blogging again, I started to think of some ideas for posts, so there will at least be a few more posts this month, and then maybe I'll continue to stick with it further into the year, too, hehe :)

My thoughts today are about simplifying. This word has been rolling around in my brain and heavy on my heart basically since I went back to work when Jordan was 7 weeks old.

Ohhhh, where to begin. And can I make a long story short? We'll see. Probably not!

From Wife to Mom

To become a mom, all you have to do is have a baby, right? Oh, so very, wrong. Though that is definitely a necessary first step, becoming a mom is about so much more than just having a baby join the household.

Transitioning from wife to mom happened deep within, in my heart, as I quickly learned that love takes on new meaning when you bear a child, and that it grows so very much so very often. That silly little things my son does bring up so much more love and joy in those moments than I knew possible!

Easy Bib Storage!

Here's my solution, if you don't feel like reading my ramblings :-) Looped a strip of cloth through the top strap holes.

Our house is not very large and is really lacking storage. I've been storing the bibs in with the burb clothes in Jordan's room... it's not that far to walk to grab a bib, but I knew there had to be a better solution for bib storage.

Enter: google.

DIY Crib Rail Teething Guard

{Leave me a note you stopped by! Or let me know if you use the tutorial & send me a pic!}


Well, my little J-man has started pulling himself up to his knees in his crib... so since I had the material to make teething guards for his crib, I thought I had better get them done sooner rather than later! 

I decided to make my own because the cheap plastic ones don't fit the rails on my convertible crib and buying a cloth one is ridiculously expensive. I am oh, so very, pleased that I made the choice... even though it did take me a little more time than I initially thought it would! :-)

So, there are multiple tutorials for this online, but I didn't find any that included pictures and details for the way I wanted to make mine (specifically, with a layer to make it waterproof), so I took some pictures as I went so I could post a tutorial, too! (Here is the tutorial I kind-of went by when I made mine, FYI!)

My Birthing Story

This is long, so if you don't feel like reading a lot, you can exit now :-)

Pregnancy and giving birth are experiences that go beyond what words can describe. Yes, there is discomfort and pain, but that is DEFINITELY not what I think of when I think of those things! (Don’t ask Josh, though, haha…) When it came time for Josh and I to decide what kind of experience we wanted to try to have for the birth experience, I came to the decision that I really wanted a natural birth. We signed up for the Bradley Birthing class – 12 weeks of 2 hours a week. That ended up to be an… interesting… experience, but we learned quite a lot from it, and felt quite prepared for a natural birth, even though we opted not to go with a midwife to help us through. I wanted no induction, no medication, no interference, just my body doing what God made it to do. That’s not how things turned out. Though at times I think, If we would’ve just done this or that, maybe I could’ve still had a natural birth, I know that we made a wise choice in order to get Jordan into our arms. This is our story.

We have a baby!

Obviously, I'm not just realizing we have a baby. Jordan has been in this world with us for 228 days, aka 7 months, 2 weeks. I can hardly believe it has only been that long, yet I can hardly believe it's already been that long! 


Here's a post I began a couple weeks after Jordan was born:

Life sure has changed. Baby "junk" clutters our house, cloth diapers need washed and hung to dry, a majority of the house doesn't sleep through the night, burp cloths grace the arms of the couch and everyone's happier when pacifiers evade their hiding spaces. Baby cries, grunts & coos fill the house and a tiny little boy steals my heart again with each sound (and each outfit change! ;)).

Our son Jordan made his entrance into this world two and a half weeks ago. In that very short amount of time, a lot of different emotions have been felt and each day brings new adventures that we never could have imagined! The first thing I have to say is that people were right, babies cause lack of good, sound sleep. They also cry, poop, and pee a lot. I have spent some time in tears over lack of sleep and over struggles breastfeeding. Those things, though, are not what actually comes to mind first as I think back through the days since June 18... What comes to mind first is the absolutely astounding amounts of love and joy that Josh and I are experiencing in an entirely new way. Josh and I love each other a lot, but we have both decided that somehow we love each other even more now! Life is a lot different, but it's definitely better!

I certainly still agree that life is better with Jordan. We can hardly remember what we did with our time without him. Or who/what was on our mind.

We've had quite a few difficulties that we, of course, did not anticipate, which have tested us in many ways. Through it all, though, we have learned a lot more about faith and trust in Jesus. I, myself, have had multiple encounters of feeling much closer to my Savior than ever before. How amazing is our God, and how amazing that he could give His Son. I cannot fathom. More on this later, I think!

I've wanted to include some updates for awhile now, but just haven't gotten to it. But now, finally, I am taking some time to do so, especially because I enjoy it! So, get ready to read some posts! :o)